Earlier this fall, four of us — total novices at long-distance treks — hiked around Europe’s highest mountain. (On the first day, big birds of prey circled high overhead. My hunch: They were vultures just waiting for one of us to drop.) The Tour du Mont Blanc is a 100-mile, ten-day hike — but we cheated a bit, hiking the best 60 miles in six days from mountain lodge to mountain lodge, catching local buses through the less exciting parts, and letting a “sherpa service” shuttle our bags each day through France, Italy, and Switzerland, from Chamonix to Chamonix. The…

What did the extended Roads & Kingdoms family learn in the hills of Emilia-Romagna? Let’s start with these eight simple rules for travel. Over five days in February, we gathered in a rainy, bucolic corner of Italy to think about the future of this small but tenacious shapeshifting organization. Of the many questions we asked ourselves over the course of the retreat, some were easy to answer, like is there such a thing as too much piadina? Incontrovertibly, there is. Others were more complex, like how does an independent media company stay viable amid the thrashing tumult of Trump-era late…

Posted by Riley Wilson on Tuesday, February 12, 2019 · Leave a Comment  It’s hard for the cosy, coastal interior design (featuring exposed brick; restored stairs; a crisp white moulded ceiling; and all original sash and double-hung windows) to compete with the view of the rotunda and Balmoral Bay. But the corner-set Pasture of Balmoral Sydney gives it a very good crack. Owners Lizelle and TJ Viljoen, neither of whom come from a hospitality background, are striving to make a conscious and positive environmental impact with Pasture, using vetted producers and Earth-friendly measures (no plastic straws, and an I-Milk bench-top…